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Мысли вслух. Учеба, шпаргалки, курсовые, рефераты.

Theoretical ph. 3 курс

Phonetics as a science, its object and methods of investigation. The functions of speech sounds. Phonetics is a branch of science, which studies speech sounds (segmental level of analysis) and intonation, accentual structure, syllabic structure (super segmental level) and phono-stylistic aspects. Its object of investigation (the smaller one) is speech sound.It has 4 aspects: 1) articulatory (=physiological); 2) acoustic; 3) auditory (=perceptive); 4) functional. They cannot be separated in speech, but we do separate them in analysis. Branches: — Articulatory ph-cs studies speech sounds as regards of their production by speech organs (it’s connected with physiology and psychology), and its direct observation is the method of investigation (instruments – a hand-mirror, laryngoscope, X-ray photography – to describe articulation of sounds). – Acoustic ph-cs connected with physics, physical parameters, properties – frequency (the number of vibrations of vocal cords for second), intensity (loudness), duration (quantity of time, length), intonation (tomography, and so on). – Perceptive (=auditory) interests in studying perception of sounds by the ear, and develops the ability to hear the sound (by the age of ten loses his ability to imitate sounds, e.g. fin, thin, sin; in Russian there is no sound TH, that’s why our children have to work out a new set of box in their minds for this sound; in English – 44 phonemes, in Russian — 36). —Linguistic and social functional aspect (not all speech sounds have this aspect), its function – to differentiate, e.g. [t] – occlusive, plosive, aspirate, voiceless, fortis; but: twice (labialized variant), try (post-alveolar v.), little (exploded literally), kitten (exploded nasally), tea (becomes narrower), state (loses aspiration). Linguists invented a new linguistic unit – a phoneme. A phoneme – is a smaller linguistic unit capable of differentiating words. Ph-ms are given in classifications. Ph-ms build up a system of oppositions; each ph-m can be opposed to another one in an identical position.

Phonology as a science, its object and methods of investigation. Phonology studies phonemes, it is a branch oh phonetics (Trubetzkoy, Prague linguistic institute – believe that it is a separate science). It’s method of investigation – commutation method (discovery of minimal pairs). The minimal pair is a pair of words differentiated with the help of 2 phonemes occurring in the identical position (ban – tan). The methods of substitution (replace 1 for another) e.g. ban – tan – fan – can is a minimal set (if you get this process on you’ll get min set). Sets: initial, medial and final. The aim of phonology is to establish the inventory of the phonemes of the given language. They do this with the help of commutation tests.

The links of phonetics with other sciences. With Grammar: 1. Reading rules help to understand the form endings are to be pronounced. E.g. It holds true the category of number – book-books, bag-bags, box-boxes (depends on the preceding vowel). 2. Sound interchange. E.g. wait-waited, beg-begged; [-id] ending depends on reading rules (goose-geese); a) vowel interchange (goose-geese), the category of number; b) consonant interchange (leaf-leaves, house-houses). E.g. write-wrote-written – vowel interchange in irregular Vs. It helps us to form different parts of speech (extend-V, extent-N; relief-N, relieve-V). 3. Sound symbolism (onomatopoeia) – the use of S.S. in compound nouns (e.g. chip-chop – рубить, hip-hop –подпрыгивать, flip-flop). 4. Intonation component (pausation, e.g. “What writing a poet is doing is interesting” – what | что делает пишущий поэт – интересно, what writing | что пишет поэт,интересно). 5. Differentiating function. Intonation alone can single out the logical predicate (e.g. Did ‘Steve get an ‘A in ‘history?). – Nuclear tone – affirmative statements with the rising intonation change into questions. With Lexicology: 1. Different parts of speech – the stress position (e.g. ‘abstract N – abs ‘tract V). 2. Conversion: a) homographs (identically in spelling) – bow – лук и поклониться [a:]; b) homonyms – black board and blackboard. With Stylistics: 1. The components of intonation – speech melody, sentence stress, rhythm, pausation, voice tember. Helps to convey the attitude of the speaker towards the situation, the participants of it, and the atmosphere. 2. Graphical expressive means – the use of rhythm, rhyme, repetition of words (e.g. Now what I want is that teach these boys and girls nothing but facts, facts alone I wanted in life). Repetition of sounds can also be found (alliteration) – the rep. of similar sounds in a close sequence (e.g. “Alone, alone, all, all alone, Alone in a wide, wide sea…” – implies the attitude of loneliness, sorrow). 3. Onomatopoeia – imitation of sounds in words (to raw, bang, splash, smack, buzz).

Phonemes and allophones. Types of allophones. A phoneme – is a smaller linguistic unit capable of differentiating words. Ph-ms are given in classifications. Ph-ms build up a system of oppositions; each ph-m can be opposed to another one in an identical position. Allophones are the actually pronounced speech sounds (variants of phoneme), they are realized in concrete words, they have features (similar phonetic features), but differ at the same time in some degree and are incapable to differentiate the meaning of words (e.g. try, twice…). Mistakes: phonemic – in a phoneme; phonetic – in an allophone. Types: 1) principal – the type of phonemic variant which is described as the most representive and free from the influence of neighboring sounds (e.g. deer), they are less changed; 2) subsidiary – positional (e.g. dark-light, are found in certain positions traditionally – final (small) and initial (light)) and combinatory (are found in the process of speech and they result from the influence of neighboring sounds).

Phenomenon of phonological neutralization.Three main approaches to this problem. Ph. neutralization is a phonological phenomenon, which happens in those particular words and their grammatical forms in which the phonemes loose their distinctive function. Due to the loss of their minimal distinctive features. One of such features for R language is the presence or absence of voice. R voiced consonants often loose voice when final (коса – коза, на лугу не было ко[с] – positional phonological neutralization). Three main approaches to this problem. Bedouin de Courtenay’s (founded the Kazan phonological school) morphological approach. He stated that not all morphemes were represented by the same combination of sounds. “The intention of the speaker doesn’t always coincide with the physical nature of the sound”. “Phoneme is a mobile element of the morpheme”, by this he bound the status of the phoneme and limited of the morpheme. So, the speech sound belongs to that very phoneme, which we found in a morpheme. In order to decide to which phoneme the sound s belongs, we should place the sound in the phonologically neutral position, in the strong position (a consonant followed by a stressed vowel). The easiest approach. Pr. Trubetzkoy’s theory (with Jacobson). They invented the new theory of the arch-phoneme, they found linguistic unit, which is broader or wider in science than the phoneme. It is neither voiced, nor voiceless, it posses distinct features which are common to both с and з phonemes.Academician Shcherba’s approach (Leningrad phonological school) – “z” always belongs to the phoneme “z”. He believes that speech sounds in a phonologically neutral position belong to that phoneme with whose principal variant they nearly coincide. This answer is considered the most expedient for teaching purposes (e.g. activity, according to Shcherba sound №12 is a phoneme №12, and according to B. de C. – is a phoneme №4). He did not approve of Pr. Trubetzkoy’s arch-phoneme either.

Trubetzkoy’s theory of phonological oppositions. Commutation as distributional method. He put forward the idea that the whole inventory of phonemes is well-organized in the system of oppositions. Every phoneme can be opposed to another. He said: “пучок дифференциальных признаков” – a unity of phonologically relevant features. Each phoneme in the system has its own unity of relevant features. The differences between phonemes are manifested in oppositions and thanks to this we can find out the inventory of phonemes of the given language on the basis of oppositional sets. He worked out the classification of oppositions: 1/ single, double, triple, multiple. Commutation (substitution) tests – verse of distributional methods. Com. test are carried out on the basis of the investigators’ knowledge of the main words and their phonemes in the opposition. Thus the method is called semantic (as you should now the meaning). C.T. – kill Bill – comparison k-b (a minimal pair). But commutation test contrast with distributional method. The adherents (сторонник) to this distributional method consider recourse (упоминание) to meaning and extra-linguistic factor and consequently they believe that commutation tests are not rigorous (строгий) enough for a scientific analysis because their prerequisite (предпосылка) is the investigator’s knowledge of the meaning of the words. Descriptivists consider it possible to group speech sounds into phonemes without knowing the meaning of words (Daniel Jones). Purely, on the distributional basis. This scientific belief is based on too assumptions: 1) If two more or less different speech sounds are found in the same phonetic context they must be allophones of different phonemes. 2) If more or less similar speech sounds are found in different positions and never in the identical (та же самая) positionб they are allophones of the same phoneme. That is why it is possible to establish the phonemic status of any speech sound in the language without knowing the meaning of the words. That is, exclusively (только) on the basis of the distributions of sounds in the language. Theoretically practical application of the method is possible, its implementation (исполнение) is hardly workable, as it encounters a number of difficulties: 1. It’s hardly possible to single out the word from their grammatical forms in the utterance you do not understand. 2. The reactions of the informant should be correctly understood. So indirectly the recourse to the meaning is still obligatory, as the informant distinguishes words according to their meaning. So, we consider the commutation method the most reliable and expedient (целесообразный) for teaching and learning processes.

Ac. Shcherba’s definition of the phoneme. He described phoneme as a dialectical unity of its three aspects: 1.a phoneme is material, real and objective. 2. a phoneme is abstractional. 3. a phoneme is functional. They can be separated only for analysis. 1. The phoneme is material as it exists in a number of articulatory and acoustically definite speech sounds. It is a linguistic reality because phonemes exist in actual speech. It is objective because they are independent of the will of an individual speaker. 2. The phoneme is an abstraction; it is an abstract linguistic unit (it refers to the language). Abstraction takes place unconsciously, and it is the most difficult object to grasp (понимание). Any native speaker pronounces speech sounds correctly but unconsciously, thanks to much practice. Every time he/she pronounces different allophones but for him it is one phoneme. 3. The phoneme is functional, since it is capable of differentiating words morphemes, sentences. Eg. Teach-teacher/ teach-beach. It is cold/ it is bold. He badly heard/ He was badly hurt. Not all speech sounds function to differentiate the words.

Main trends in the phoneme theory. The basis for their classification. Three aspects singled out by Shcherba (abstract, material, functional) provide us with the basis for classification of the phoneme theories. According to which aspect of the phoneme is particularly favored by the linguists, we distinguish three groups of conceptions. Conceptions based on abstract aspect. There are several varieties of them.Mentalistic psychological (originated by B. de C.). It defines the phoneme as an ideal psychical image of the sound (псих эквивалент звука). Actually pronounced speech sounds are in perfect realization of such images. There is a discrepancy of intended sound and the one actually pronounced. This view was sheared by Sapir, Zommerfield (phonemes as models which speakers seek to reproduce) and was elaborated by generative phonology and the idea of the phoneme as a target was recently been used again, although under different terminology by Tatham. In another variety of entirely conception called abstract theacoustic and physiological properties of the phoneme are completely ignored. It was originated byФердинанд де Соссюр. «Фонема отнюдь не есть что-то звучащее, но нечто бестелесное, образуемое не своей материальной субстанцией, но исключительно теми различиями, которые отделяют её акустический образ от прочих». Others: Hjelsmlev, Shaumyan. In the second group, psychical, the material aspect is brought to an extreme, while its abstract character is denied. The psychical view regards the phoneme as a family of related speech sounds. A mechanical sum of such sounds: from a philosophical point of view, such definitions may be qualified as “vulgarly materialistic, metaphysical”.Criticize: The concept of the house is not a mechanical sum of all the houses existing in the world; a phoneme can’t be viewed as the sum of all the speech sounds (variants). Supporters: Daniel Johns, Block and Trager. It views the phoneme as a group of articulatory similar sounds without any regard to abstract and functional aspects of a phoneme. Functional aspect. This group of conceptions regards the phoneme as the min sound unit by which meaning may be differentiated. Meaning differentiation is important; it’s the basic characteristic of a phoneme. These conceptions disregard material & abstract character of the phoneme. It’s only the distinctive function of speech sounds, but it ignores constrictive & recognative. A phoneme is not a family of sounds, since in every sound there are only a certain number of articulatory features, involved in the differentiation of meaning. It’s the so-called distinctive features of the sound, which make up the phoneme corresponding to it. Trubetzkoy: «Фонема – это пучок дифференциальных признаков» (+Haley?). These distinctive features become distinctive in oppositional sets. Some approaches within these take oppositions as the basic elements of phonological structure (Plotkin, теория кинокемы, Broomfield).

English vowel phonemes. The articulatory classification of English monophthons. The definition of the vowel phonemes. When we try to define the vowel ph. we take into consideration opinions of 1. Daniel Jones (based on the acoustic aspect). 2. Baudaun de Courtenay (based of the physical characteristics). Jones says that “the distinction between vowels and consonants is based on the acoustic considerations”. In his opinion, vowels are more sonorous than consonants. Analyzing it, we see that it is not sufficient (подходящий) to define a vowel. Some of the consonants are very sonorous too eg. Constrictive sonorants w, r, l, j (Jones calls them semi-vowels). B. de Courtenay defined vowel ph. on the basis of its physiological features. He discovered that the production of vowels and consonants is different. In production of a vowel phoneme the muscular tension is spread over all speech organs, and when we produce a consonant, muscular tension is concentrated at the place of articulation. So, the main principles of production differ. This opinion backs acoustic characteristics. That’s why now phoneticians combine these two opinions (Васильев). Vowel phoneme is a voiced sound in forming which the air passes through the mouth and the pharynx, there being no obstruction that would cause any audible friction (трение). In the production of the vowel ph. the muscular tension is spread over all speech organs. The air stream causes the vocal cords to vibrate. For teaching purposes articulatory classification is preferable to acoustic classification. Principles:1.the stability of articulation (monophthons, diphthongs, diphthongoids). 2.the lip position (rounded, unrounded). 3.the length (short, long). 4.the degree of tension (tense (long English vowels are tense), lax (short v. are lax). 5.character of the vowel end (checked, unchecked). Only for E. language. 6.the position of the tongue (the movements of the tongue: vertical: front, front-retracted, central, back-advanced, back. Horizontal: close, mid, open). The E. and R. classifications differ in: 1. the number of classes.2. terms of which vowel ph. should be assigned to which particular class (eg. λ).3. terminology. The R. linguists say that the term “central” is incorrect, as the sounds ∂ and ∂: are different from R. central vowels and it is better to call them mixed.4. in qualitative presentation. Br. and Am. classifications do not reflect the qualitative differences between vowels in pairs, because both of vowels are placed in one and the same class. Acc. to Jones, they are allophones. The only difference between them is in quantity (length). The length of the vowel is not distinctive feature of the present-day E. It used to be a distinctive feature, but now ı and ı: differ not only in the length . Vasyliev’s class. is supposed to be the most expedient for teaching purposes, as it brings structural symmetry. In modern E. length is not a distinctive feature. Tenseness is more important. Tables of classifications.

The phonemic status of English diphthongs, triphthongs and affricates. It is the object of sharp linguistic controversy. The question is weather English diphthongs are monophonemic or biphonemic (belong to two phonemes) and they are combinations of sounds). To answer the question the scientists suggest applying 3 criteria:1. Articulatory indivisibility (неделимость), 2. morphemic indivisibility, 3. syllabic indivisibility. Most phoneticians (British) believe that diphthongs exist. But Am. phoneticians believe they are clusters (combinations) (Block, Tradger).1. Artic. ind. — Acc. to spectrograph we know that diphthongs are indivisible in their articulation. 2. morphemic ind. – neither a morpheme boundary nor the point of syllabic boundary. 3. Syll. ind. – division can separate nucleus from the glide of a diphthong. The syll. and morphemic ind-ty of a diphthong is also proved by the fact that in such languages where diphthongs are not found (eg. Russian) the elements of free sound combinations are easily separated from each other by the point of syllabic division and morpheme boundary eg. чай-чаю-чайный; стой-стоять-сою. The combinability of the elements of a diphthong like complex is very high. And its another proof that in Russian there are no diphthongs. But in E. the number of diphthong is limited to8. We can classify them: 1.cetring d. — центростремительные eı aı oı ∂u au. One more proof that the duration test supports the view of the E. diphthongs to be monophonemic – their length is the same that the length of the historically long sounds (eg. joy-Goe). A great number of oppositions can be built between monophthongs and diphthongs and between diphthongs eg. bear-beer-boy-bay-buy. The phonemic status of triphthongs. The question is whether they are monophonemic whole. 1. acc. to stenograph, there is division in their articulation. 2. controversial, because the triphthongs meet the requirements only in the part of the words eg. hire [haı∂] – one morpheme, one syllable. Леонтьева: There are no triphthongs in E., they are biphonemic and disyllabic, and they consist of a diphthong and a monophthong. To sum up, there are 20 phonemes: 12 monophthongs, 8 diphthongs. There are no triphthongs – they are only clusters.

English consonant phonemes. The articulatory classification of English consonant phonemes.The definition is based on acoustic and articulatory principles. Consonants are known to have voice and noise combined in their production. while vowels are known to have only voice in their articulation – acoustic consideration. The differences between consonants and vowels is due to the work of speech organs. In case of vowels no obstruction is made, in case of consonants various obstructions are made. Consonants are characterized by close articulation (a complete/partial/intermediate blockage of the air passage by the obstruction). The closure is formed so that the air stream is blocked or hindered. The result of this is audible friction (трение). The definition: Consonants are sounds, in the production of which voice is combined with noise as the air stream meets the obstruction in the mouth and nasal cavities, which causes audible friction. Classification: The most expedient for teaching purposes is articulatory classification. Principles of it: 1)the work of the vocal cords (voiced/voiceless).2)the force of exhalation (выдыхание) – fortis/lenis.3)the position of the soft palate (nasal/oral consonants).4)active organs and the place of obstruction. There are many classifications. The most expedient are classifications made by D.Jones, Vasyliev, Trachtorov, Tarsuyev. They differentiate in: 1.the number of classes distinguished2.in terms by which these classes are designated, 3.what classes some of the consonants are assigned to. Russian classification seems to be more complete, logical and thorough. 1. D. Jones doesn’t divide consonants into 3 major types (occlusive, constrictive, affricates) with further subdivision into smaller group. What he gives as classes are in fact subclasses. As a result, D. Jones classification fails to demonstrate all the distinctive features of the consonant phoneme to their best advantage. In R. classification all consonant phonemes are opposed to each other. 2. D. Jones uses the term “semi-vowels”. R. – “constrictive sonorants”, which is more logical, as we talk about consonants. 3. acc. to Jones [h] is laryngeal (where the vocal cords are), acc. to R. classification it is pharyngeal (the very back of the mouth cavity).

The phonemic status of English affricates. It is a controversial problem and is based on the principle of stability of articulation. The question is whether they are monophonemic entities (объекты) or biphonemic clusters. Am. descriptivists Block and Tradger believe there are no affricates in E. Another extreme point of view is by D. Jones. He believes there are 6 of them: t∫, dз, tr, dr, dz, ts (his colleagues + dθ, tθ). To solve the problem we should apply 3 criteria: 1. Articulatory ind-ty,2.morphemic,3.syllabic. Russian phoneticians consider t∫, dз to be affricats, because they meet the requirements: they are indivisible articulatory; occur only in the same morpheme and syllable (large,joy,chap,catch). [tr, dr] – articulatory are very close to each other, but still there is a difference, their indivisibility is rejected. There are a lot of cases they are in one syllable and one morpheme. D. Jones doesn’t grant the status oof a phoneme to [tr, dr]. He says they are affricates, but he avoids question they are phonemes. [tz, dz] – not phonemes obviously. They are divisible articulatory eg. pad-pads, pet-pets – different morphemes. To sum up, we should state that there are 24 consonant phonemes in English. There is a question about №25 [m – opposed to w] – voiceless and labio-palatal e.g. where- wear, which-witch. But the majority believes that this optional phoneme is an allophone, not a phoneme.

Phonetics as a science, its object and methods of investigation. The functions of speech sounds.

Phonology as a science, its object and methods of investigation.

The links of phonetics with other sciences.

Phonemes and allophones. Types of allophones.

Phenomenon of phonological neutralization. Three main approaches to this problem.